Volunteer Groups Work To Restore Sheridan Park

On the last Saturday in September, a group of motivated Trinitas Regional Medical Center and Trinitas Comprehensive Cancer Center employees, dedicated members of the Elizabeth Garden Club, Elizabeth High School students, Gardener’s Touch, and other local volunteers joined in a day of traffic park improvement, organized by local non-profit, Groundwork Elizabeth.

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The group pulled stubborn weeds, and then proceeded to plant nearly 500 tulip, crocus, daffodil, and other assorted flower bulbs at a gateway entrance to the City of Elizabeth, at the corner of Pearl Street and North Broad Street. This traffic park is located only a block from the Union County Courthouse and Elizabeth Public Library, and serves as a focal point for the thousands that pass it each day.

Work began at the site in April, after months of planning. Funding for many of the plants was made possible by outreach to a local foundation and other private sector parties. To date, hundreds of evergreens, perennials, annual flowers, flowering shrubs, have been added to the tree lined triangle. The city has helped in many landscaping sessions, and recently installed a new flagpole to highlight the improvements. Still expected is a gateway sign welcoming all to this section of Midtown, the entrance to the Historic Midtown Special Improvement District.

Gary S. Horan, FACHE, president & chief executive officer of Trinitas is elated at the progress at the park, “All of us at Trinitas Regional Medical Center are grateful to everyone who invested their time and effort to transform Sheridan Park. Their hard work has resulted in a beautiful entry to our main campus, one that will lift the spirits of our patients, employees and visitors.”

Alice Holzapfel, president of the Garden Club of Elizabeth, was instrumental in forging the vision of the project from the very beginning, “The Elizabeth Garden Club takes pride in beautifying our treasured Elizabeth landscapes”, she said during the planting.

A ceremony rededicating the park is expected in early spring, 2010.

Alice Holzapfel, president of the Elizabeth Garden Club (standing in white at the left of the photo), speaks to Trinitas employee Joann Blount about the logistics of planting the more than 450 bulbs at the Sheridan Park site, at the corner of Broad and Pearl streets while a group of hearty, motivated volunteers dig in her view.